Chasing Mrs. Knightly (Chasing 5)

Toby strode over to join Lucy on the sofa, holding her close. “Give him some credit, love. As you can see, Kyle Matthews is still alive and breathing. He might be able to contain himself. After all, he’s trying to prove that he’s a good husband to Sienna.”

“You two aren’t helping at all.” Even my friends thought this was amusing. Well, ha bloody ha.

Trying to focus my attention on different matters other than Sienna and Kyle, I pulled out my phone to check for messages, and just when I was about to get engrossed in one, Freya came out of the kitchen and announced that dinner was ready to be served. Graciously thanking her, we all got up and looked about, wondering if Sienna and Kyle were to show up any second now. So when they didn’t, the same old inkling settled in the pit of my stomach.

Striding over to the staircase that led over to her studio, I pried my ears open for any indication of what they were up to, but my attempt at eavesdropping was in vain, for there was no sound coming from downstairs.

“Sienna?” I called out. “Sienna?” This time, I yelled a little louder. “Dinner’s ready, poppet.” They were downstairs, yet the absence of sound could only mean a few things. My mind was leading me to the gutter, and I tried to steer clear of it until I had spoken to my wife.

After waiting for a minute or so, she finally emerged, followed by a somber looking Kyle. Sienna’s eyes were red, and it seemed like she had been crying.

“Is something the matter, mi amore?”

She shook her head before giving me a brave smile. She had an air of fragility in her, therefore I didn’t press further. Glancing at Kyle, I was a tad taken aback when he looked apologetic.

“I apologize for the wait. We were catching up, and it seems like some stories are harder for Sienna to talk about.”

I stilled, knowing quite well which particular story he meant by that—Camilla. I was too bereft to say anything else except nod in his direction before we both followed Sienna, heading towards the formal dining room.

She was wearing a rich colored olive green dress that brought out the beautiful colors of her eyes. As always, she was impeccably gorgeous. My eyes drifted towards her swaying hips, noting that even the way she walked showed a dancer’s grace about her. Just in the nick of time, I also found Kyle Matthews’s eyes admiring the same thing I had been. I made a low, grumbling sound, hoping he’d get the hint that he shouldn’t extend my hospitality to such insult.

I supposed it was a good thing Lucy engaged Kyle with a conversation about his work in the music industry. My friends could be such a pain in my arse, but at times like these, they knew me too well. I appreciated their joint effort in keeping peace, even if the tension between us men was blatantly obvious.

Dinner was served and the chitchat commenced. With my mood quite settled, instead of paying attention and taking part in the discussion they were having about the war going on in Middle East and Eastern European countries, I found myself more consumed by my thoughts than the conversation. I wondered how my own wife couldn’t confide in me, or if it was too difficult to speak to me about it, why she hadn’t at least mentioned something so we could get someone for her to speak to about what still troubled her. And yet, she had been in tears, talking about it with Kyle. What was I doing wrong that I couldn’t even get my own wife to tell me she was still haunted about what had occurred almost a year ago?

Truth be told, when I was away on one of my business trips, I would get dreams about what had transpired in that hospital room. It would appear in my dream, as if it was truly happening, and I would end up yelling for Sienna to run. Every time after I screamed, I’d wake up in a sweat. If she wasn’t with me, I worried, but as much as I wanted to protect her with a security team, she insisted she didn’t need one unless she left the country.

Could it possibly be because of Gareth? Sienna had trusted him, and in the end, she hadn’t seen his betrayal coming from a mile away. His treachery had possibly dug deep, making her wary of the people she surrounded herself with, security detail included.

If she’d let me, I’d do anything in my power to help her through if this was one of the major causes of her troubles. I knew what had occurred had been beyond demoralizing for anyone, however we made a pact that we were going to move on, and I wanted us to be in the same pacing in regards to the future. I was the main reason why these events all had happened to her, to us, in the first place.

I owed it to her to help her exorcise the demons that still haunted her.

My bitterness and jealous emotions seemed pointless when one truly saw the bigger picture. I was more subdued compared to how I had been an hour ago. Besides, I should be grateful that having Kyle here tonight had brought out that information instead of Sienna hiding it from me. She would probably endure all of the demons that hounded her until the end of time. Sienna was stubborn. Still, it was quite apparent we needed to work harder on our marriage.

It was our first year—we were bound to make hundreds, maybe thousands, of mistakes—but as long as we communicated and compromised, we would have a much stronger bond.

After dinner, Lucy and Toby didn’t stay long since the two had important business to take care of first thing in the morning. Since Lucy wasn’t sure what type of business venture she wanted to get into, she had offered to shadow her husband, to learn more about how to handle business dealings and transactions.

“I better go, too. I’m still jet-lagged,” Kyle said out loud, turning to Sienna before he directed me his gaze. “Thanks for having me, Knightly. I appreciate that my relationship with Sienna didn’t end because you guys got married. This means a lot.”

This was his way of offering me an olive branch, and as much as I wanted to hate the man, I knew that his short vacation here would open Sienna up. Furthermore, in doing so, I hoped she’d bare more of her thoughts and fears. After all, this was her best friend since childhood. They shared some kind of bond that even I couldn’t interfere with or penetrate. It was terrible to admit this, even to myself, but it was the truth. Therefore, hopefully, with my acceptance, it would benefit us all—as long as he didn’t cross the bloody line and try to steal my wife away. In such an eventuality, this cease-fire would no longer exist.

“It’s time to move on. I love my wife, and I’d do anything to make her happy. Having you in her life makes her so much more blissful. I’d do anything to keep it that way. Thanks for coming over, Matthews.”